The Hunting Party

Radovan Karadzic

As many of you probably know, Radovan Karadzic was finally captured and arrested on Monday near Belgrade. The interesting thing is, that at least according to the BBC, the reason for the capture seems to be a consequence of increasing pressure by the European Union for the capture of known war criminals/fugitives in order to improve the chances of Serbian membership.

Also according to another article, the formation of a new “pro-European” government also played a vital role, most specifically the replacement of the former head of Serbian Intelligence, Rade Bulatovic, with Sasha Vukadinovic, who took part in arresting one of Serbia’s mafia groups.

Either way, is this proof that “soft-power,” or rather the main foreign policy strategy of the European Union in tying countries closer to a European market is actually working and effective? It’s no secret that the EU has always played a vital role in the area during and after the Yugoslav wars, (Germany’s military was deployed, and found itself to play its largest post-WW2 role outside its soil), and they seem to be effectively continuing this policy.

The only question now is how fast he will be transferred to the United Nation war crimes court in The Hague. Apparently his lawyer has three days to appeal the judge’s order for the transfer.

The ironic thing is that literally two days ago I just finished watching the Richard Gere movie, The Hunting Party, which is loosely based on the hunt for Karadzic. The movie concludes that the reason for Karadzic being able to so easily evade capture was because of the unwillingness of the US to place any effort in his capture, or rather a conspiracy. It will be interesting to see if any new information submerges regarding how he was able to remain at large for so long.